Hiddush, a trans-denominational organization aimed at promoting religious freedom in Israel, was launched at a press conference in Tel Aviv on Monday.

The new group, a partnership between Israeli Jews and World Jewry headed by Rabbi Uri Regev and American businessman and Jewish philanthropic and communal leader Stanley P. Gold, challenges the status quo of the religious power structure in Israel and aims to build up grassroots momentum for change.

Some of Hiddush's goals include instituting civil marriages as well as ensuring recognition for Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist marriages and conversions, and providing equal funding for non-Orthodox religious services, said Regev, CEO of Hiddush, in a telephone interview withThe Jerusalem Post.

He spoke out against the social ills facing the country that in his opinion were caused by the religious involvement in the state, including inequality in education, employment and army service, discrimination against women, refusal of ultra-Orthodox schools to implement the legal requirement for teaching mathematics, English, sciences and civics and the limitations on use of public transportation.

In conjunction with their launch, Hiddush commissioned a large-scale public opinion survey by well-known Israeli pollster Rafi Smith where time and again, a majority of Israelis were found to be against the status quo.

This marks the beginning of an ongoing Religion and State Index that Hiddush will conduct. Among the key findings:

84% of secular Jewish Israelis think the state should grant equal status to all 3 major streams of Judaism (Orthodox; Reform; Conservative);

84% object to the current system of mass exemption from army service for men who study in yeshivas;

92% of secular Israelis support ending the ultra-orthodox monopoly on marriage; 95% of new immigrants from the Former Soviet Union;

72% of Jewish Israelis object to the current policy of making conversion to Judaism contingent on observing the Sabbath and Kashrut (ritual dietary laws) and retroactively revoking conversions for not fully observing Sabbath/kashrut;

66% of Jewish Israelis believe that Israel should take into consideration the opinions of world Jewry on matters of law of return, conversion, marriage and matters of religion & state;

80% of Jewish Israelis object to the gender-segregated Mehadrin bus lines, public bus lines that segregate women and requiring that they sit in the back;

Tension between secular and ultra-orthodox is second in importance, after Arab-Jewish tensions, and double that of the tension between left and right or between poor and rich;

71% support reducing financial support given to yeshivas and large families (5+ children) in order to increase participation in the workforce;

60% of Jewish Israelis support the separation of religion and state in Israel.

There should be no state support for religious institutions or functionaries. They should be funded privately, as they are in the US.

Religious issues should be brought before an impartial commission made up of rabbis of the three denominations: Orthodox, Conservative and Reform. The Knesset and municipal councils are not proper places for debating religious matters.

There should be no compulsory religious court jurisdictions over family matters. If both sides wish to bring their case before a religious court, that is their right, but they should not be compelled to do so.

No institution should receive public funds if its members do not serve in the IDF and do not pledge allegiance to the flag.

Reform and Conservative rabbis must be given the same rights as Orthodox rabbis

The offices of the chief rabbis, established under Turkish rule, should be abolished. They are superfluous and often harmful. The same holds true for municipal religious councils.

All men and women of military age should be compelled to serve in the armed forces. Those who cannot serve for "religious reasons" should spend an equivalent amount of time in public service.

The teaching of Jewish consciousness and Zionism should be reinstituted into all school systems.

Schools which do not meet the minimum state curricular requirements should be shut down.

Equal time should be allowed to all denominations of Judaism on publicly-owned media.

Those primarily to blame for the growing power of the Orthodox establishment are not the religious or the ultra-Orthodox, but the secular.

In a capitulation born of a mixture of fear and ignorance, most of them have allowed the rabbis, ever since the state was established, to dictate the manner of their births, marriages and deaths.

…In light of the unrestrained lunacy of the Hardal (Zionist ultra-Orthodox) rabbis and their war against those rabbis who have sought to make conversion easier, young Ethiopian leaders have been left with no choice: They must ignore the pressure and, like Kehat, issue an emancipation declaration to their community.

Don't give in, they must say. Don't convert.

…The Rabbinate will surely not declare them kosher, but don't be afraid. You are Israelis and your children are Israelis, and it makes no difference what the Rabbinate writes - or what the state shamelessly copies from it.

Part of a genuine conversion is the guarantee that the one converting will keep themitzvot. This means that all Ethiopian "converts" must go to religious schools.

…In 10 years, when all Ethiopian Jews will be considered full-fledged Jews without a problem and Jewish law is maintained, we will look back and thank the Chief Rabbinate for holding its ground at a time when they could have satisfied everyone and pushed the problem down the line.

The reemergence of the Bnei Anusim phenomenon has created challenges for Portugal's mainstream Jewish community, for the Chief Rabbinate in Israel and for the Bnei Anusim themselves - many of whom seem to share a deep sense of exclusion and frustration alongside a profound desire to belong to the rest of the Jewish people.

This summer, hundreds of Bnei Anusim convened in Barcelona for a conference focusing on Israel advocacy.

They are aided by Shavei Israel (formerly Amishav), a Jerusalem-based organization that seeks to strengthen the connection between the Jewish people and "lost Jews" from around the world. The group, which maintains a permanent emissary in Portugal, has assisted dozens of Bnei Anusim converts in the country.

"We don't need to become Jewish, we are and have always been Jewish," he says.

Vitorino, his wife and five children underwent Orthodox conversion in 2004, with help from Shavei Israel.

The Chief Rabbinate has not yet recognized the 2004 conversion, which was approved by Lisbon's chief rabbi.

Fifteen residents of the northern border town of Shlomi in northern Israel filed a High Court petition on Tuesday against Education Minister Gideon Sa'ar and Shlomi Local Council head Gabi Na'aman demanding they be allowed to transfer their children to a secular school in the Western Galilee region.

Special military arrangements for the benefit of the haredi community in the Intelligence Corps, Air Force, Education Corps, and Nahal Brigade are the first steps in a bid to allay very real fears and anxieties.

This is a slow process that cannot be expected to end in one day, after more than 50 years of reclusive haredi life.

Any attempt to accelerate the process through threats and boycotts will prompt the opposite reaction than desired.

A heated fight over the potential arrival of ultra-Orthodox families to a predominantly secular town near Jerusalem has resulted in an unusual court case, involving an employee of the Joint Distribution Committee and an American born Holocaust scholar who called him an anti-Semite.

A Haredi web site dedicated to studying Mishna in memory of Capt. Asaf Ramon was set up on Sunday.

The "Behadrei Haredim" Web portal devoted its headline to the initiative, which represents a small breach in the official Haredi policy of distance from Israeli national tragedies in general and in the army in particular.

People who respond to the memorial effort will commit to study all six books of the Mishna, as is customary in times of mourning.

Jewish-American businessman Guma Aguiar, who recently took over the ownership of soccer powerhouse Beitar Jerusalem after donating $4 million to the team, said he has no political aspirations, unlike previous ownerArcadi Gaydamak.

Speaking to Ynet at the Hadar Yosef Tennis Center in Tel Aviv, said he chose to support Jerusalem's team because the city "is the center of the universe."

A Florida district court banned industrialist and Beitar Jerusalem soccer club patron Guma Aguiar from coming within 20 meters of prosecution witnesses in a trial between himself and his Uncle Tom Kaplan.

The ban follows a complaint by Rabbi Leib Tropper, who claimed this week that Aguiar assaulted him and threatened to throw him from the window of a Jerusalem hotel last April.

Israel police were not able to explain why the assault investigation against Aguiar was closed two weeks later.

The Jerusalem district prosecution decided to reopen the investigation following an appeal filed Tropper's lawyer.

Tuesday's videoconference is part of a project initiated by European Jewish Congress President Moshe Kantor, which aims to foster stronger ties between Diaspora communities and Israel.

The project will allow representatives from one Jewish community every month to hold a video-recorded discussion with an Israeli official or opinion-shaper. The videos will be posted online at www.leadel.net

The next videoconference will be held in October with Hungarian Jews, and the one following with representatives from the Jewish community in Milan.

A former Knesset member, the writer leads several civil society movements.

The way to narrow the gap between the mess we are in and the place we would like to go could be through religious peace and interreligious dialogue.

…The Mosaica Center, which I head, deals with the core questions of coexistence and endeavors to create cooperation particularly among people with religious beliefs, who have been totally excluded from the process until now.

The two very intensive spiritual months of Ramadan and Tishrei create a double period of spirituality, an opportunity for finding God and for God to find us.

As both Judaism and Islam express it, it is a time for us to recognize where the human limitation is and where we need to leave it to the Him to assist us and direct us. May it be God's will that we utilize this unique opportunity to build hope in a world which desperately it.